


The Blood in Your Veins

by Aelaer



Category: Doctor Strange (2016), Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: (this should be a tag lol), Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Different First Meeting, Canon-Typical Violence, Canon-typical resignation to a possibly terminal condition, Chapter-specific warnings in A/Ns, Gen, Gen or Pre-Slash, Getting to Know Each Other, Hollywood Science, Hurt Stephen Strange, Hurt Tony Stark, Kidnapped Tony Stark, Kidnapping, Medical Procedures, Medical Professionals, Multi, POV Stephen Strange, Palladium Poisoning
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-30
Updated: 2021-03-11
Packaged: 2021-03-17 04:07:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 16,992
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29093955
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aelaer/pseuds/Aelaer
Summary: An overly-long prompt story written for tumblr's @ironstrangeprompts #608: Kidnapped to play doctor for a still unseen other prisoner, Stephen realizes there is only one person on the planet who would have palladium in their blood.
Relationships: Tony Stark & Stephen Strange, Tony Stark/Stephen Strange
Comments: 94
Kudos: 137





	1. How it Began

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally posted on tumblr, but the chapter parts were getting so long and it was getting longer than I thought it would be, so I'm moving all posting to AO3.
> 
> Currently 4 parts were on tumblr, I have 6.5 written, and 11 outlined. I don't try to post WIPs but, you know, YOLO. It may get longer, depending on how much the characters want to talk. Because this was originally for tumblr, the chapters are shorter than my usual fare (though the current trend is that they're getting longer with the newer parts lol). There is no planned update schedule at this time, sorry guys :P I'll probably update the stuff I have written depending on initial feedback.
> 
> The first four parts are mostly the same but have been polished and slightly added to, and betaed by the wonderful nemmy. She betaed everything, so everything is better because of it.

Stephen's thoughts were sluggish and his memory spotty as he began to wake up. Worse, he had a headache that was boring into his temples and made the idea of opening his eyes, never mind moving, sound like an absolutely terrible one.

Sound began to filter through the fog. Eventually he was able to distinguish some words within it.

"...waking up…"

"...pulse is still slow…"

"...considering what he was given…"

He recognized none of the voices. Through sheer stubbornness alone, Stephen ignored his pounding head and forced his heavy eyelids open, only to immediately close them again against the sharp brightness of the fluorescent lighting above him. He could not help but groan.

"Right, the lights," someone—female—said, and he felt a cloth placed over his eyes. "I'm afraid I can't do anything about the lights, but you'll adjust to them soon enough. I have some water for you when you're ready, too."

Some part of Stephen's brain registered that she had an English accent. The rest of the functioning part of his mind focused on speaking. "Who…" And that was all he could manage at the moment.

"My name's Doctor Summer Weston," she answered.

A doctor? Was he injured? He wet his lips and tried for more than one word. "My... injuries?" What had he been doing to get injured? How bad was it? How much morphine was running through his system?

He felt Doctor Weston's fingers on his radial pulse. (Why was she doing that? Where was the EKG?) "No injuries; your current headache and sensitivity to light are an after effect of the drug in your system. I think you're at the tail end of your symptoms, though."

That… made no sense in a number of ways. Stephen forced his eyes open once more, and the cloth over his eyes made the endeavor manageable this time. "What happened?"

He heard her exhale softly. "What is the last thing you remember?"

Stephen had to pause to think about it, which was both incredibly unusual and rather annoying. He frowned to himself as he concentrated. Was he at the hospital? No, he was off. He was… "Grocery shopping. I was at the store. I think I paid." Yes, he remembered paying. He had decided to walk the three blocks to and from the store and was heading back to his apartment. Beyond that point, his memory became fuzzy.

Doctor Weston didn't say anything about his answer and instead just said, "You need water. Do you think you can handle the light? If not, we can keep the towel over your eyes and I can help you up."

He didn't respond, but moved his arm up and pulled the cloth away from his eyes, squinting at the ugly rectangular panels above him. The other doctor helped him up into a sitting position and gave him a bottle of water, but Stephen was too busy staring at his surroundings. While he was on a medical bed, in front of him was a large room that could only be described as a biochemical lab. It had state-of-the-art equipment, much of it looking brand new, and working there was another man and two women all in lab coats. Against nearby walls away from the machinery were several other medical beds.

"Drink," Doctor Weston encouraged, and his parched throat more than anything had Stephen doing so.

"Where am I?" he asked, squinting at Doctor Summer Weston. She appeared somewhere between thirty and forty and currently wore her long brown hair in a messy bun. She was pale and looked tired, with dark bags under her grey eyes and thin lips bent downturned. She wasn't wearing any makeup, either, which was a look he knew on his female patients before surgery but usually not on female doctors (and a couple of non-female doctors, too).

"I don't know," she answered. "None of us do."

Stephen's confusion (and alarm, though he wouldn't admit that yet) grew. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

She gave him a rueful smile. "There's really no easy way to break this: you've been kidnapped, just like the rest of us."

He stared at her in disbelief, half-wondering if he heard her right. His head was still pounding with his heartbeat and that made his hearing less clear, after all. "What?" was what he managed.

"Yeah." The lackluster smile returned. "So, are you an orthopedic surgeon or a neurosurgeon?"

"Neurosurgeon," he automatically answered, then stared at her. "How did you know?"

"The X-rays," was Doctor Weston's inexplicable answer. "I'll show you in a bit," she said as Stephen was about to retort. "We should get introductions out of the way. Drink more water."

Stephen frowned at her, but his head was still complaining and for that reason alone he drank instead of demanding further answers that moment. At least the light was becoming more bearable.

In the meantime, Doctor Weston called to the others, "He's fully awake now. Take a break for introductions and water."

One of the women, who was in her mid-forties, he guessed, with thick straight black hair pulled back, and a coppery brown skin that appeared in tight and worried lines across her face, shifted in discomfort. She adjusted her narrow-rimmed glasses then looked over to the wall, and Stephen followed her gaze to see a camera in the corner. "How long have we been working?" she asked; she also had an English accent.

"About five hours," Doctor Weston said after looking at her watch. "You should be okay for a few minutes."

"I think so. I have to wait for the centrifuge to finish, anyway," said the third woman, and the tallest of the three women (though maybe it was her natural curly hair giving her extra height). Her white lab coat contrasted sharply against her rich umber skin under the bright fluorescent lights, and just like the others, she looked stressed and tired. She appeared somewhere about his age and was definitely American, with the slightest hint of a southern twang in her voice.

The final one in the room, a balding man with salt-and-pepper hair and perhaps in his mid-forties or early fifties, stepped forward from his work station first. His complexion was a flushed pink and he wore thick lenses, but they did nothing to hide his bright green irises. "How are you feeling?" He spoke with a heavy German accent.

Stephen grimaced. "I've been better," he answered as he was surrounded by the four of them.

"We know what it feels like," the African-American woman replied. "I'm Doctor Jada Ferguson. Hematologist, University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston."

"Doctor Meera Mahajan," said the other unnamed woman. "Pathologist with a specialty in cytopathology, from St Bartholomew's Hospital in London."

"I'm from London, too," Doctor Weston added. "Though from St Thomas' Hospital. Cardiothoracic surgeon."

"And I'm Doctor Steffen Baar," said the man. "I work as a pharmaceutical chemist for Bayer in Wuppertal, a city in western Germany."

Stephen wrapped his mind around this new information as they introduced themselves and started trying to connect the pieces of this (terrifying) puzzle together. After they finished speaking, he cleared his throat and said, "Doctor Stephen Strange. Neurosurgeon, Metro-General, New York."

Doctor Ferguson made an affirmative noise. "I read your latest publication not that long ago. It was fascinating."

"I've read yours as well," Stephen said, then looked at the others. "I've read publication papers from all of you within the last three years." And there was a reason he remembered their names; they were all brilliant studies and they were clearly experts in their specialties. Why the _fucking hell_ were they all here?

His face must have reflected his thoughts, because Doctor Mahajan said, "Whoever brought us here wants us to work." She glanced over her shoulder, then added, "Which is apparent. And they want us to work—constantly." She opened her mouth again, paused, then shut it.

Stephen frowned. "Work on what, exactly?"

Doctor Weston also looked over towards the camera, then said, "Our job is to keep an unknown patient alive. And you've been drafted."


	2. Get Me Through the Night

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> When I first posted this on tumblr I didn't include "played bys" for the original characters. I know that having faces to associate with characters can help a lot, and since they're in for the long run, here's a cast of actors if you'd like to put a face to a name:
> 
>   * Meera Mahajan is played by Mindy Kaling (current age with glasses—see "The Mindy Project")
>   * Steffen Baar is played by Chris Berman (the sportscaster, at 50-55)
>   * Jada Ferguson is played by Gugu Mbatha-Raw (current age, andddd we're gonna pretend she's not actually cast in the Loki TV show as well because I didn't know that before selecting her.)
>   * Summer Weston is played by Jennifer Connolly (at 35-40 years old; 2005's "Dark Water" is a good film to reference. Also, I selected her before I realized she was married to Paul Bettany. Now I'm worried that Mindy Kaling has some connection to the MCU, too.)
> 

> 
> And just like Hollywood likes to do, absolutely none of these people are from the country the character they "play" are from, haha.
> 
> Finally, I said I had 6 parts written and 11 parts outlined last chapter. It's now at 8 parts written and 15 parts outlined. No, I really don't know how long this thing is going to be. And I decided to tweak the title slightly because the story has turned out to be completely from Stephen's POV rather than a changing POV as I thought I was gonna do. So the new title makes a bit more sense in that aspect.

The time on Stephen's watch read 5:24 p.m. on April 24, 2010. Doctor Baar caught him looking at his wrist as he helped prepare samples for the pharmaceutical chemist.

"If your watch is set for New York time, it will not match here. I do not think we are in America."

"What makes you say that?" Stephen asked. He was told that talking was allowed so long as they still worked, but a couple doctors gazed over at the camera as that was said. He got it; they were being both watched and listened to. Great.

"Breakfast should come in the next two to four hours. Or at least, they are more breakfast-like foods. Eastern European, maybe Middle Eastern. I am not entirely sure." The German doctor adjusted the microscope he looked into and kept his head down. "They do keep us well-fed, for what it is worth. You will not starve here."

Playing lab technician was not something Stephen had done since medical school and it was not something he particularly enjoyed. He wasn't exactly in the position to change his circumstances at the moment, however—and there were a lot of blood samples that needed preparation by someone, and he wasn't one of the lab specialists. So he took on the prep work. It was tedious, but necessary in their situation.

"Breakfast?" Stephen frowned. "Then when do they let us sleep?"

"At the beginning, when Doctor Ferguson and I were first brought here, we were permitted to sleep seven hours. They even dimmed the lights." Again the doctor kept his head down, appearing very focused on his work.

Stephen followed his lead and kept his eyes on the centrifuge tubes he was preparing. "How long have you been here?"

"For us, it has been a month. It was maybe two weeks later when Doctor Mahajan joined us. Doctor Weston has been here for only a few days." Doctor Baar typed a few notes into a computer and replaced the slide with another one; both slides had a small drop of blood upon them.

"I don't suppose that computer has an internet connection," Stephen muttered.

The chemist smiled dryly. "That would be useful, wouldn't it?"

Stephen had nothing to say to that and the conversation petered out into nothing.

* * *

When Stephen had first awoken, he wondered if the doctors were ordered to wear the lab coats. After being awake and working, however, he quickly realized that the others were likely wearing them because it was outright cold in the room. The lab coat wasn't particularly thick material, but it was another layer of clothing.

He wanted to ask about the whole clothing situation. A lab coat had been waiting for him at his cot, but where was the rest? Were there specific rules for eating and showering like there were for sleep schedules? Stephen had hundreds of more questions about their entire situation that he wanted to ask Doctor Baar, but the chemist's request for silence came before he had a chance to ask them. And he respected it; it was a need that he understood well.

That meant that he wasn't able to ask any further questions until his watch read 6:41 p.m. and Doctor Mahajan asked if he could be spared for more sample handling at her work station.

"Thank you for joining in the work so quickly," Doctor Mahajan said after relaying her instructions to him. "I am surprised you didn't elect to sleep further first. You were heavily drugged."

"I get through stress best by working," Stephen replied, "though I haven't done lab work for some years." The knowledge that he had been _kidnapped_ was a thought he had pushed into the back of his mind, placing it in a spot to deal with _later_ (when he inevitably had to). In the meantime, he wanted to distract himself as much as possible and gather what information he could regarding his circumstances, and he had the opportunity to do both right now.

Doctor Mahajan continued lowly, "Doctor Weston has been helping us a lot since her arrival, but she deserves further rest. She remained awake during her time to sleep to monitor you."

Stephen had been instructed by her to place samples onto slides and label them in a specific manner on both the slide and computer, so he was in the process of doing just that. "What is this about taking shifts to sleep? Doctor Baar mentioned it had not always been like this."

"It changed about a week ago," she answered. "It was just before Doctor Weston was brought here. Before, during my time here, they had only come in once to deliver new equipment that Doctor Ferguson requested."

"How're food and messages usually delivered?" Stephen asked.

"Through the slot at the bottom of the door," she said, then lowered her voice even further into a near whisper, leaving Stephen straining to hear her. "But they came in again." She went off on a tangent to add, "If they come once more, put your hands on your head, quickly. They're impatient." Doctor Mahajan then paused to enter something longer on her own computer before continuing to speak in a whisper. "They said the last time they came that only one of us could sleep at a time, and we needed to eat meals faster. There would be 'consequences' if we didn't." She quickly pivoted the subject. "Let me know when you are starting to get tired; my sleep shift started an hour ago, but Doctor Weston needed it more. We will need to adjust to about five hours a shift with your arrival, too."

Stephen frowned down at the slides as he listened to her words. "What could be so damn important that we can only sleep one at a time? What are these samples for?"

Doctor Mahajan didn't answer immediately. When she did, he again had to strain to hear her. "The less you know and the less you guess, the safer it will be for you. Please don't ask me again."

* * *

The time was 8:30 p.m. in New York when Stephen finished storing away his prep work for Doctor Mahajan. She had gone for her sleep shift about 45 minutes ago. Just as he finished, he heard a metallic scraping sound that sounded near-deafening in the quiet room.

"That's breakfast," Doctor Ferguson told him as she turned to face him. "We have a table to eat at over there." She waved a hand at a corner of the room, towards a dingy-looking plastic-topped table and three metal folding chairs. Their contrast with the surrounding, state-of-the-art science equipment was almost amusing. "They don't like us eating together all at once. You and I will eat first."

She sent a couple silent gestures to the other two doctors, then went towards the door. Stephen followed her and eyed the entrance up and down. It looked like it was made of steel and in no way was going to be forced open. Beside the door were two large closed containers. Doctor Ferguson picked one up, leaving Stephen for the other, and he followed her to the table.

The containers turned out to be filled with an ample amount of food: several pieces of flatbread, a chunk of cheese, a chunk of butter, another container filled with a porridge of some type, and something that resembled yogurt but didn't quite smell like the yogurt he was used to. There were also two large canteens of what turned out to be tea and coffee, and enough dishes and cutlery for them all.

"Doctor Baar wasn't kidding," Stephen muttered. "They do want us well-fed."

"It wouldn't do them any good if we were too weak to work," she replied. "Help yourself to whatever you want."

Stephen avoided the yogurt-looking substance, but took a bit of the rest and helped himself to some coffee. It wasn't spectacular, but it was manageable. "Doctor Baar mentioned that you, alongside him, have been here the longest, Doctor Ferguson."

"Call me Jada," she answered. "It seems ridiculous to be formal in a situation like this. Summer—Doctor Weston—agrees with me."

He raised his brows. "And the other two?"

"Steffen doesn't seem to care either way; he's a tough read. Doctor Meera Mahajan always refers to us by title, and seems to want the same. I think it helps her disassociate from our circumstances—helps her cope. We're all worried, but she's having the toughest time of it."

Stephen looked sidelong at the British woman as they spoke about her; she was currently asleep in one of the beds along the far wall. The stress lines across her brow had hardly faded. His eyes quickly caught sight of the unlabeled pill bottle on the floor just beside her glasses and the leg of the cot. "Pills?" he asked.

"Oh." Jada paused for a moment in thought. "She has a condition—best if she tells you, rather than me. I'm not her doctor, but…"

"I get it," Stephen answered.

"Steffen has his own pills, too. A different condition. But you need to let us know now if you need anything daily; they'll have it to you within a day, if it's like when they got the other pills."

He shook his head. "No, I'm fine." He then glanced towards the camera at the corner near the door. "They're very well-stocked."

"Very," she muttered.

"Who are these people?" Stephen muttered back. "What do they want with us?"

"No idea who they are, but I can show you what they're having us do after breakfast." Jada jutted her chin to his plate. "Finish up; we've been talking too long without getting work done. They're even starting to get annoyed at longer showers. Though to be honest, I don't know why I still try and bother with shampooing; that white people shampoo has completely ruined my hair."

Stephen snorted softly at the unexpected comment. "Should send a complaint to management."

She half-smiled, then continued. "We've gotten a couple changes of clothes, extra towels, and water containers as needed—they brought stuff in for you when you arrived, by the way, it's in that cabinet." She pointed to one of the cabinets on the wall. "Hell, the second week we even got a washing machine and drying rack when Doctor Mahajan joined us. You'll see those when you go to the bathroom area." Jada gestured to an offshoot near the cots, a hall that quickly went out of sight. "But while they'll bring things as requested, I wouldn't push my luck with this group. They can be—harsh, I guess is one way to say it." Jada then turned fully to her meal and Stephen followed suit.

After they ate, she led him back to her workstation. Doctors Baar and Weston took their turn to eat breakfast as Doctor Ferguson opened a cabinet between her and Doctor Baar's workstations.

Stephen stared blankly at the contents within. On one shelf were a number of inorganic compounds: calcium hydroxide, lithium carbonate, lithium hydroxide, hydrogen peroxide, and lithium peroxide, to name a few. On another shelf chlorophyllin, several supplements in the form of vitamin C, vitamin B12, magnesium, calcium, and iron, and a bottle of Calcium EDTA were all in sight, though there were other things behind those. There were also various fruits, of all things, on the very bottom shelf.

"The fruits aren't for us, by the way. The citrus fruits are never for us." She tapped a handwritten recipe beside the cabinet. "You can make the drink right now. We're making it twice a day at this point. Refrigerated items are over there." Jada gestured over to a small medical fridge.

His bewildered gaze went from the cabinet to follow her hand, then fell on the recipe. "What the hell is this for?"

"Our patient." She went to her microscope and placed a slide under it. After a moment of adjusting the focus, Jada said, "Come take a look at this."

Stephen stepped up to the microscope and frowned to himself as he looked at what happened to be a blood sample. The white blood cells showed clear signs of toxic granulation and he saw both basophilic stippling and microcytic anemia in the red blood cells.

"Well," he started, "the patient does _not_ have normal-looking blood cells. I hope you have more than blood samples to work with."

She half-smiled. "Lucky for us, we didn't have to search for what was causing these abnormalities. The patient has palladium poisoning."

Stephen lifted his head from the microscope to stare at her. " _Palladium_ poisoning? Is the patient chewing on engagement rings?" Seriously, _palladium_?

"It gets weirder," Jada answered. "We found with the samples we got that calcium EDTA could solve the trick for a one-time poisoning, but the patient is being continually exposed to this palladium and it's not leaving the body. The smoothie," she nodded to it, "was on us to make from the first day we got here, to treat symptoms and to limit the spread of the poisoning. Not sure how they figured it out; we think they have a doctor on their team, so it may have been them. We've added a couple other things to try and help the patient's body fight it and to overall increase their nutrient intake. Start making a cup; we leave it at the slot and they'll collect it with our dishes."

Normally Stephen would not be thrilled to be ordered around as such, but again, his circumstances weren't exactly normal—and his brain was still trying to come up with an idea as to how someone would be continuously exposed to palladium, of all things.

As he began to make the drink and Jada returned to her own work at the microscope, he asked, "And I suppose that you've been tasked to find some sort of permanent cure against continuous palladium exposure."

"Bingo," she answered. "During my second week here we began experiments with lithium compounds after we saw potential in the samples. After Doctor Mahajan arrived, she suggested lithium dioxide which has had the most effective results in slowing the poisoning. Several tests later, Steffen synthesized a stable mix with the least likelihood of side effects.

"But as you saw, it slowed down the spread of poisoning; it hasn't done anything to fully stop it or repair the damage. We're still seeing a deterioration in the patient's tests. The current trend is leading into a direction that, if we don't figure something out soon, will leave the patient dead in two months—even with regular lithium dioxide injections."

Stephen's frown remained a permanent fixture as he mixed the strange smoothie and listened to her. "Do these people know this?"

"Yeah," she answered. "And a couple days after we told them, Summer arrived. We're still trying to find a more permanent solution, but she was given X-rays yesterday."

"Doctor Weston did mention an X-ray earlier."

"I haven't had a chance to look at them yet. I guess they're having her explore another avenue." Jada jutted her chin to the smoothie. "Cap the smoothie and leave it by the door; Steffen will put everything that needs to go back into place in the containers. And if you're up for it, I could use a hand inputting all my notes into the computer."

It was something to do, so he agreed.

* * *

It was 11:13 p.m. according to Stephen's watch when he agreed to take the sleep shift after Doctor Mahajan starting at about 12:30 (at least in New York). Steffen Baar had been after Meera Mahajan before Stephen's arrival, but the chemist wanted to finish some experiments that would take more than two hours to complete, apparently, so they 'may as well start the new shifts now'.

So Summer Weston pulled him away from his transcribing work with Jada Ferguson to discuss some matters with him before he went to sleep.

"Your latest paper on neurogenesis was fantastic, Doctor Strange. Some of the more complex concepts went beyond my medical knowledge, but what I did understand really excited me for what we may see in neurosurgery in the future."

His ego ate the compliment with ease, but he replied politely, "Thank you, Doctor Weston. Your own pioneering work with robotic cardiovascular surgery is bound to help cardiothoracic surgeons across the world."

She waved a hand. "Summer, please."

"Call me Stephen, then," he said. "You mentioned you had some X-rays?"

"Yes." They reached her workstation and she clicked on a folder on her desktop. "They're not incredibly helpful, though."

He was about to ask what she meant, and then the first image came up. Stephen raised his eyebrows. The image was of a male torso with several splinters of some sort of foreign body scattered throughout the chest. But instead of showing the entire affected area as an X-ray usually would, the image was cropped midway up the torso, leaving off the upper chest entirely.

"And this one is why you're here, I'm afraid," Summer said, and again he was presented with a strangely cropped X-ray. This one was taken from the side; the spine and a couple inches of the body was shown, but it was cropped before the sternum. In what he could see from this X-ray and in comparison to the first one, there were a couple shards dangerously close to peripheral nerves and one uncomfortably close to the spine.

"How is this man still alive?" he muttered. "Are these shards causing the palladium poisoning?" What palladium item would create such trauma in the first place?

"It's amazing he's alive," she said in agreement. "And take a look at the heart X-ray." She went to the image (again cropped to cut off view of the sternum) and, other than the foreboding shards lodged about the area, he immediately saw the issue.

"His heart is too far left," Stephen muttered. "What's pushed it there?"

She offered him a slight smile. "I have written to them," she gestured to the computer, "that I will not be able to give them an accurate idea of surviving a surgery without full chest X-rays at the least, and that I would definitely need an orthopedic surgeon or neurosurgeon for the shards near the nerves." She then gave him an apologetic look.

Stephen didn't bother answering; what was done was done. "They can't expect us to perform surgery on this man without a full X-ray at the least."

"I don't think they want us to," she answered. At his questioning look, Summer clarified, "They're still trying to find a more permanent solution to the palladium poisoning with the other three, but they are running out of time. We're more of a last resort."

He wasn't quite sure how he felt about being a last resort (he felt a bit miffed, actually, but he had enough sense to realize that this was not a good time to express his annoyance). "Doctor Ferguson said two months." Stephen looked again at the X-ray, and he found himself frowning; something was tickling at the back of his mind, some piece of knowledge that was relevant to all this, but it remained elusive.

"Hopefully they won't wait until the last minute for the surgery," she answered.

Stephen spent the rest of his time awake studying what imaging and tests had been made on this male patient. Obviously no MRIs were done on him, but alongside the cropped X-rays there were extensive blood tests, images from a CT scan, urine tests, lung function tests results, and cardiac function tests. There was more than enough data to read through and get a better idea of the overall health of the man he might have to perform surgery upon.

When he eventually took his turn to sleep, he found himself exhausted and fell quickly asleep. Stephen's last waking thought was the puzzle of the palladium and the niggling, niggling suspicion that he was missing something he already knew.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tony is injected with lithium dioxide in _Iron Man 2_ to slow his poisoning. In reality, this chemical compound doesn't exist. Its real-life cousin, lithium superoxide, would definitely not be good for his body considering you use Kelvin to measure its temperature (aka very very very cold). Its other cousin, lithium peroxide, doesn't seem nearly as bad, but not exactly what you'd call anywhere near accurate science. But this just means that the fic can get away with some Hollywood Science.
> 
> Hollywood Science is used in the ingredients for his symptom-counteracting drink (for instance, chlorophyllin has no proven health benefits, just conjectures, and treating metal poisoning is a good deal more precise than I write here and these ingredients are all rather loosey-goosey, though I try to put some real world logic into it). Huzzah!
> 
> Medical people: if you see anything blatantly erroneous (and clearly not Hollywood Science in the form of fictional treatments), please let me know.


	3. Signs Were Not Really That Scarce

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think this is the last short, tumblr-oriented chapter. Every other chapter after this looks to be at least 3k words and while I'd like to try to keep them under 4k, a couple have crept up to 5k and keep trying to creep up. Which keeps having me split more parts. I have about 35k words written so far in 10-11 parts (of 16? 17?) to give you a new update on expected length. I keep thinking of new things which forces me to go back to earlier parts for minor editing, which is why the posting is a bit slower to start. I expect it to speed up once I have everything solidified.

Doctor Baar was going to sleep, but Doctors Ferguson and Weston (Jada and Summer, Stephen reminded himself) kept him busy immediately upon waking him up. The former had him prepping more slides and helping input her handwritten data into the computer, while with the latter he started the loose beginnings of a plan for surgery with the incomplete picture they had.

By the time another two hours had ticked by and he was working again with Doctor Mahajan on prepping yet more samples, Stephen was doing all in his power to focus on the repetitive tasks at hand rather than let his mind wander to consider his circumstances.

He was very good at focusing; he always had been. It was partially his power of intense concentration and attention to detail that he was able to perform surgeries that others simply didn't have the skill to perform. Despite his relatively short career thus far, he was already making a name for himself amongst his peers.

But at this point in Stephen's life, the type of focus he put upon his work was for challenging surgical cases and hypothesizing new and improved techniques in the neurosurgical field. That meant the relative monotony of lab technician work could only distract him from his thoughts for so long. And as the minutes ticked by, Stephen was starting to feel the crawling anxiety of the unknown inch forward.

He forced himself to slowly inhale, then exhale. He did it again for good measure. Then he pushed his wandering thoughts towards something calm and more meditative. This turned him to mentally reviewing as many recent studies as he could recall reading within the larger medical field.

Immediately the papers of his fellow abductees came to mind, and Stephen pushed past those to the unrelated papers he could remember. And there were plenty of those, enough he could recall to categorize them by specialty. His near-eidetic memory certainly helped there—and it was more interesting than listing off the discographies of all artists on Billboard's Top 100 of 1981, at least in these circumstances.

This exercise began helping quickly. His memory did not have these papers memorized word for word, but he could remember the important bits of each study and he began to recite them in his head. What part of his mind wasn't focused on Doctor Mahajan's slides went through the names of doctors, the titles, the abstracts and summaries, and whatever little details he could recall from his readings over the last year.

The neurology papers came first to mind, naturally. Recalling all new research over the last several months put him at ease; it was in this realm that his own ideas began to take root, drawing from the conclusions of other neurosurgeons to develop his own hypotheses to begin research on later.

But Stephen had no place to jot down his stray musings, which brought reminder to his situation once more. Before any anxiety about his circumstances could take root again, he instead abandoned neurology to remember papers in other fields, even as his nimble fingers continued transferring the blood samples to slides, each labeled accordingly.

He planned on continuing as such without pause until all blood tests had been prepped (and the amount of testing and the speed of results that was being accomplished for a single man was truly phenomenal). But Stephen's hand suddenly jerked, nearly ruining one of the samples.

Doctor Mahajan stood just to his right and, at such proximity, noticed. "Doctor Strange? Are you alright?"

Stephen didn't process her question immediately; his brain was still reeling from the sudden realization. His mind was in the middle of citing a recent cardiothoracic study when he remembered another article. It wasn't even a study in the normal sense of the word, but rather a look at the miraculous ways a body can survive trauma and the modern technology used to help in the process. One part of the article covered the miraculous survival of—

"Tony Stark," he murmured aloud.

Doctor Mahajan sent him an alarmed look. "Not so loud!" she hissed.

Stephen blinked, then looked back at her. He ignored her comment, but made sure to keep his voice low. "I remember reading about the technology he used to keep shrapnel from his heart. It had a palladium core, the implant. We're trying to keep Tony Stark alive, aren't we?"

"Don't talk about it," she snapped back in a whisper. She refused to look at him.

Stephen paused and frowned at her. What the hell was her problem? "Do you have an issue with me?" he asked the Brit, his voice unconsciously rising in his irritation.

Doctor Mahajan shook her head but continued to avoid looking at him. "Just—just leave me alone."

Before he could say anything (and what could he say to _that?_ ) he heard "Stephen," come from behind him. He turned and Jada was there. "Summer needs your help in making out something on an X-ray. I'll continue assisting Doctor Mahajan."

With one last frown at Doctor Mahajan, Stephen nodded to Jada and made his way to the cardiothoracic surgeon on the other side of the room. When he reached her, he asked, "What is it?" There was no X-ray pulled up on the computer.

"Doctor Mahajan is on the verge of a panic attack," Summer explained softly. "Jada recognized it. She'll help calm her down."

Unwelcome guilt edged into his conscience. "I didn't know."

"We know," she reassured him. "We're not blaming you. Meera won't, either. But she has rather bad anxiety that is more sensitive right now for, well, obvious reasons."

Probably what the medication was for, Stephen presumed. "I didn't mean to trigger an attack."

She nodded. "I know," she repeated. "What did you say? We'll want to avoid whatever it was in the future."

He cleared his throat and then lowered his voice further. "I figured out who on earth would have continuous palladium poisoning. His name did it."

Summer exhaled and nodded. "It was only a matter of time before you figured it out."

Stephen frowned once more. "You know the patient is Tony Stark?"

"Everyone does," she answered in a whisper, "but we don't mention it. I'd not say his name again, either; we haven't figured out if there are microphones in here or how strong they might be. We don't know if they care that we've figured it out." And after saying that, she opened the actual X-rays on her computer and shuffled through her notepad to look busy.

Stephen took her lead and stepped closer to look at her notepad as if reading it. "I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that others would remember the news—about what was told of the procedure that saved his life," he said. "There was nothing written indicating any reaction to the palladium core, though."

Summer shrugged. "He never mentioned it. I looked through every mention of his procedure I could find when they were first published, and there weren't many. The patient only gave his version of events and never let any doctor closely study it, from my understanding." She pursed her lips. "It was the X-rays that gave it away for me, at least."

"I was reciting medical papers I could remember. A cardiothoracic study nudged my memory to one of those articles that came out last year about his survival." Stephen pressed his lips together into a thin line. "But with the last newscast I heard about the patient a few days ago, I honestly should have thought of him sooner."

She pretended to write something down. "Kidnapped twice within a year's time," she murmured. "That's rough. Do you remember when they reported him missing on the news?"

"March 20th," he said. Stephen recalled easily; Tony Stark's disappearance during a race in India was all anyone was talking about for a week. "So just over a month ago."

She nodded and flipped to another X-ray photo. "Fits the timeline of how long Steffen and Jada have been here, too. They came a few days after that, if I recall correctly."

Stephen nodded and, as he stared blankly at the X-ray, found himself falling into his thoughts. Tony Stark—until very recently a weapons manufacturer, and who, also until very recently, Stephen would have turned away if given the chance. Granted, he wasn't quite at the point where he could easily turn away patients to other neurosurgeons. He was certain he'd be there in two to three years in both the level of demand for his services and his influence with the hospital's administration. But even then, even as a neurosurgeon who was still growing in prestige, if someone had asked him a year ago if he wanted to operate on Tony Stark, he would have said no.

That was a year ago. That was before Tony Stark got kidnapped by terrorists for three months and came back ending all weapons production in his company. That was before he became some sort of—Stephen didn't want to use the word _superhero_ , but he didn't know what else to call it.

Stephen had no idea what he thought of Tony Stark now. He had little reason to consider him beyond the gossip on TV and within the office. But now here he was, forced to be part of a team to help keep him alive.

Mind boggling.

He exhaled softly and focused again on the cropped X-ray on the screen. His opinion on the billionaire, whatever it was, hardly mattered right then. Whether he wished it or not, Tony Stark was his patient and as such, he would do his best to perform his duty as a doctor. Whether that meant simply helping out with samples or performing what would be a long and complicated surgery remained to be seen.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The race in India is from a ridiculous limited edition tie-in comic that I could only find information about on the 2010 timeline on the MCU Wiki. It made a great plot device though.
> 
> Lil tidbit: When I realized that this prompt fill was going to become A Monster, I knew I wanted each part to have a name. So before publishing the first part, I went through my Spotify favorites and wrote down all my favorite lyrics in a document. This document has now grown into 6,000 words of possible lyric titles for chapters and fics.
> 
> (Feel free to try and guess where the titles come from if you want. Each chapter title is a full or partial lyric from favorite songs/artists of mine.)


	4. Seeing Red Again

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Chapter-Specific Warning:** This warning should be considered a warning for the rest of the story henceforth, as it pertains to a villain OC. It doesn't get into any of the preordained archive warnings (like super graphic violence or non-con - this is still a teen fic), but the archive warnings don't cover every possible thing that can upset people for legitimate reasons. Anyway, the primary antagonist in this series is an incredibly sucky human being. Part of his assholeness can include behaviors such as racism, sexism, equal violence against men and women, homophobic remarks, religious bigotry, and overall just being a terrible human being. In this specific chapter he goes for the first three, but I can't guarantee he won't hit on those other aspects sometime in the future because he's just *a really bad person*. I'm not attempting any sort of grey-scale morality for the primary antagonist in this story. He's just a dick. If that means you'd rather not read the rest of the story, that's okay and I hope you check out my lighter fares with Stephen and Tony :)
> 
> For the rest of you sticking around, enjoy the chapter! It's a doozy!

Another three days passed with little change in Stephen's schedule. He went for his sleep shift at 12:30 a.m. New York time and was woken up by one of the others between 5:20 to 5:30 a.m. It wasn't enough time for even two complete sleep cycles, but everyone there—perhaps with exception to Steffen Baar, who was a chemist—had gone through grueling schedules during medical school and residency. So they were, in some ways, used to it.

After waking up, he had fifteen minutes to shower, shave, and change into the clothing about his size, provided for by his captors. From there, he then got to work. His sleep shift ended about three hours before dinner came—about 8:30 a.m. New York time—and a small snack arrived at what was about midnight locally, but was 2 p.m. according to his watch. Breakfast came eleven to twelve hours after dinner, when it was evening in New York, and he went to bed again half an hour after the east coast's midnight hour. Apparently while he slept, another snack break came for those awake.

The one small blessing in all of this was that the people holding them realized the power of caffeine and provided black tea and coffee every time they brought them food. He didn't think there were any cameras in the showers or toilets, either, which was—hopefully true. There was nothing obvious and, truth be told, he didn't really want to look much further for evidence.

Throughout his waking day, Stephen largely helped prep samples for blood analysis. He tried to strategize with Summer about how to best utilize their resources, should surgery be required, but they had little to go on. They had yet to receive better X-rays of their patient—of Tony Stark, which still baffled Stephen—so much of their planning was about logistics.

"Doctors in the United States are required to complete a surgical rotation in their third year of med school," Stephen said, "so Jada will know basic surgical procedures. Do you need to do the same in the UK?"

"Yes," Summer answered. "All doctors go through the two-year Foundation Programme which always includes training in general surgery. So Doctor Mahajan will be able to assist us as well."

"They can serve as our nurses and techs," Stephen muttered. "But what about Doctor Baar?"

Summer pursed her lips together. "No medical training—but I would rather have him on hand than not. If we said we can't use him…"

Stephen grimaced and nodded. "Point. He can certainly hold a retractor." He blew out a breath. "We'll need a heart-lung machine. You can't just pick one of those up at an IKEA."

"None of this equipment is cheap or easy to come by," she pointed out, jutting her chin to the advanced machinery scattered around the room. "I don't think that will be an issue for us. Whoever these people are, they have resources."

He pursed his lips together. "We also need an anesthesiologist."

She paused at that and sighed. "Yes. Yes, we need one of those. Unfortunately, I think we're going to be working with someone on their team if the surgery happens."

Stephen made a face. "What makes you think that?"

"When they first showed me the X-rays, I told them I would need another surgeon for the spinal area—you—and an anesthesiologist. They only spoke about finding me a surgeon, so they must have their own medical team that includes one."

He sighed. "Of course they do. He better be competent."

Summer shrugged. "Not much we can do about it. And there's not much more we can plan for this hypothetical surgery until I have better X-rays."

And so that ended that discussion and, three days later, there were no changes on that end. No new X-rays had come in, so both he and the other surgeon were stuck helping prepare samples and input data.

And Stephen hadn't been so bored in years.

One wouldn't think that being held captive would be boring, especially if one was doing medical work during that time. But when said medical work was repetitive lab work he hadn't done since med school? And doing it for about fifteen hours a day for three days straight with no music, no reading, no _nothing_ to help bring some distraction or variety to his work? It was absolutely mind-numbing. A small part of him wasn't entirely sure if he could survive like this for—how long did Jada say Stark had to live without a cure or intervention? Two months? He couldn't do this for two months. He was going out of his mind after three days.

It was about halfway through his shift on the fourth day that he regretted ever thinking he was bored.

He was typing up results from various tests performed by Jada when the door to the room was suddenly slammed open. Startled, Stephen immediately turned towards the sound, only to see five men enter, all of them with guns pointed to the rest of the room. Beside him, Jada immediately threw her hands on top of her head, and he quickly followed suit.

"Come quietly! Do not fight!" said one of the men. Stephen couldn't even begin to guess his accent; maybe it was Eastern European? Russian? Former Soviet bloc in Asia? Somewhere in that region of the world, which wasn't particularly helpful information considering there were some twenty to thirty countries there.

Summer was on her sleep shift, though looking over his shoulder, Stephen saw that she had woken up to the sound and was pushing herself up. But he couldn't look at her or the other doctors long as he was grabbed by one of the men and forced to walk. The gun the man carried quickly negated any ideas of retaliation.

They were led down a hall; he could see Steffen, Meera, and Jada in front of him, all being led in the same rough manner he was going through. The walk itself wasn't very long, perhaps a minute, but to Stephen it felt like every second was dragging. Despite his best efforts, his heart was starting to race at this new development.

The man with Steffen finally stopped in front of a door and unlocked it, then shoved the chemist inside. Within seconds, Stephen was at the door and being pushed forward himself. He took a quick look around, as much as he could without moving much: a decent-sized room, maybe 15 by 20 feet, with concrete walls and no windows, just like where he and the other doctors were being kept. Cot in the corner. Table with a computer and covered in bits of wires and electronics that he couldn't begin to label. A nook in the farthest corner that concealed a bathroom behind the wall, maybe. There were also two other men armed with enormous guns—some sort of automatic rifles—and then one man who was crossing his arms and staring at him and his fellow doctors with a look that immediately put Stephen on edge. This man, this man radiated the air of a person in charge.

And then there was him. The famous Tony Stark, or Iron Man as he was calling himself these days. He looked like a former shadow of himself, being several pounds thinner and bearing a sickly pallor that Stephen immediately noticed, even during his current circumstances.

A look of surprise was upon Stark's hollow face, but as Stephen focused more upon him, it was quickly replaced by the cool anger of a man biting his tongue.

All five doctors were maneuvered to face Stark in a line before being forced to kneel. Stephen bit his lip to hold back a grunt of pain from his knees hitting the concrete floor.

"You say you are 'calling my bluff' with your medical team," said the man. He pushed himself off the wall and passed out of Stephen's line of sight. "Here they are." He started at Stephen's right as he went through the doctors. "Steffen Baar, chemist." A step closer. "Jada Ferguson, hematologist." Another step, and he heard Doctor Mahajan inhale sharply. "Meera Mahajan, pathologist."

Another step, and the man was behind him. To Stephen's utter horror, he felt cold metal press against the back of his head. "Stephen Strange, neurosurgeon." The metal then left his head and he heard another step. "Summer Weston, cardiothoracic surgeon." Another step, and he could see the man in the corner of his eye again, this time on his left.

Tony Stark kept his lips pressed in a tight line as their captor went through the line. When he finished, the billionaire swallowed and looked at them all. "Good job keeping me alive this long, docs," he said.

"Not good enough, Stark," the man snapped. "Their solution is only a band aid. They give you but a few more weeks. They are called the best doctors in the world, and they cannot yet make a cure?"

Stephen forcefully held back his retort regarding the man's utter ignorance. It was an outright miracle the other doctors had found any sort of solution as quickly as they did to delay the spread!

Stark, it seemed, agreed with him, and had no such reservations with holding back. "That's insane, Yusifov. It takes teams of chemists and doctors months, if not years to create what you're looking for."

He couldn't see it, but Stephen could almost feel the sneer from their captor, this Yusifov. "In that case, you don't need this many doctors, do you?" A couple steps and he was again behind Stephen, further to the right. "I'm no doctor, but as far as I can tell, these two both look at blood and try to fix the problem. Neither of them fixed it, not fully. So who do you want to keep, Stark? The black American or the Indian Brit? One less woman won't make a difference."

Stephen dared a glance to his right when he heard quick breathing. Doctor Mahajan was visibly shaking and starting to hyperventilate; to her right, Doctor Ferguson was quiet, but her lips trembled and tears pricked her eyes.

Stark stepped forward, and several guns rose at the action. He stopped but held his ground, raising his hands. "Don't do this."

"Why not?" the man retorted. "You refuse to work because you are dying. They have failed you and one will pay the price. Perhaps both; they are both from lesser races."

As Stephen processed the fact that he heard a comment like _that_ in _fucking 2010_ , Doctor Mahajan's breathing accelerated into full on hyperventilation. His medical mind noticed it immediately.

But another was quicker to the draw. "Breathe through your nose, Meera," Summer said lowly. "Try to inhale for one-one thousand, then exhale through pursed lips. You can—"

"Shut up!"

Doctor Weston was smacked on the back of her head hard enough to send her sprawling to the floor.

And Stephen snapped.

Now, if one were to ask Doctor Stephen Strange, he would by no means consider himself heroic or noble. His role as a doctor was one of service, but even within his relatively short time as a neurosurgeon, he had gained a prestige that recognized his rising star and already people in the medical community were considering him in the top ranks of neurosurgeons. Soon, demand for his expertise would be large enough for him to have the option to turn away those who weren't worth his time, and he felt not a lick of guilt for that. His skills were _valuable_.

But to hear this brute of a man first throw slurs at two of the most brilliant women—no, the most brilliant _doctors_ —in their fields followed by an outright assault on the other caused a protectiveness Stephen hadn't felt since his sister's death to completely overtake him. He saw red.

He leaped up at Yusifov in a fiery anger, no particular idea in mind except _stop him from hurting anyone_ rushing through his head. At this point there was little thought, only adrenaline and a near primal fury running through his veins. It wasn't like him to be so hot-headed; he was a man who kept his cool under the most stressful of circumstances. But perhaps several days of poor sleep combined with the stress of the situation finally got to him. When he thought about it in the aftermath, even he would admit he had no idea what he was thinking.

It was a spur-of-the-moment decision he would come to regret.

In one moment he managed to knock the pistol out of Yusifov's hands and punch him in the face. He recognized screaming, shouting, fighting in the noises behind him, but he was focused on his own target.

Stephen hit him twice more before someone threw an arm around his neck and dragged him back and began to choke him. He clawed at the arm, which did nothing, but then he aimed his heel down right to the sensitive part of his attacker's instep. The man grunted in pain and the grip around his neck loosened.

A shot shattered through the enclosed space, causing Stephen to freeze in both surprise and shock as his ears ringed from the blast—and that proved to be his downfall. He saw Yusifov raising his pistol just before he was whipped across the face with the weapon. The hit threw him off balance and he fell to the floor and lay there for a second, stunned. He felt wetness on the side of his head. His ears were still ringing.

As Stephen attempted to push himself up, a kick to his back sent him again to the floor. An involuntary grunt of pain escaped him. He closed his eyes, pausing for breath, but was given little time to recover as he was grabbed by both arms and dragged up to his knees. From his new position, he could see the rest of the room once more, and Stephen's heart skipped a beat at what was before him.

There were several alarming sights: Tony Stark on his knees just like him, nose bloodied. One of the gunmen near Stark with a _screwdriver_ stuck in his neck and very much dead. Summer in the corner of the room, holding a shaking Meera against her chest.

And Doctor Steffen Baar on the ground, bleeding out from his stomach as Jada desperately tried to stem the blood flow with her lab coat. The red dripped through the white fabric and onto the concrete.

Stephen felt ill. He instinctively reached forward towards Steffen, to try and help, but the grip on his arms tightened and kept him in place.

Stark was the one to speak first. The ringing in Stephen's ears, while still strong, had abated enough that he could hear him around it. "Let them help him. I won't fight further. I'll do what you ask."

Yusifov came back into Stephen's line of sight as he stepped in front of him, though his gaze was on Stark. He said to the engineer, "You killed one of my men. A life for a life—that is fair, wouldn't you say?"

"He did _nothing_ ," Stark hissed, pulling against the hands that held him down. Stephen could see the men pull him back and tighten their grip in response. "And he's needed. You wouldn't have brought him here otherwise."

"He didn't do anything," Yusifov agreed, then turned to Stephen. "This one did." He then sent a sharp kick into Stephen's stomach, causing him to double over in pain as far as the men holding him allowed. He almost missed the next statement. "And I should kill him for it. But the surgeon will be needed. The chemist, though? He failed to make a cure for your ailment with a month of time, and you don't have much longer to live, Stark. The chemist failed, and at this point, he's a waste of resources."

Then Yusifov nodded at one of his men, and he grabbed Jada by the arm and yanked her up to her feet.

"No—please, no, don't do this!" she shouted as she was dragged away from Steffen. Their captors ignored her and Yusifov walked up to the wounded man. He aimed his pistol at Steffen's head.

"Don't do this!" Stark shouted.

A shot rang through the room. A loud sob came from the corner before it was muffled. The ringing in Stephen's ears came back with a vengeance and he found himself half deafened from the sound. His stomach churned; he felt like he was going to vomit. He hung his head and closed his eyes, trying to breathe slow breaths through his nose.

All he could smell was blood. He forcefully suppressed his gag reflex.

Stephen missed whatever conversation came next, too busy trying to calm his breathing, trying not to throw up, and not having the energy to make out the words beyond the tinnitus. But then the world was moving as he was pulled to his feet and shoved out of the room, leaving behind Tony Stark and the body of Doctor Steffen Baar.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was stuck on what I wanted to do with this part with a handful of ideas and consulted my beta for ideas. She suggested death which I wasn't even thinking of because I'm very bad at killing off characters. I blame her fully :P
> 
> Another note: I have two British OCs in this story. While I'm acquainted with some British English slang and colloquialisms, I am by no means an expert and if any British-English speakers note one of the British women say something that sounds like American English rather than British English, please feel free to let me know! I like accuracy where I can have it.


	5. We Found Ourselves Drowning

The moment they were locked back inside the lab-cum-cell, Stephen locked himself in the bathroom stall and vomited. It hurt his bruised chest and the acrid smell and taste assaulted his senses, but that was a well-deserved penance, so far as Stephen saw it.

Never, in all his time during medical school, residency, and his time as a doctor had he ever lost his stomach's contents. Not during the most gruesome scenes in surgery, not after terrible car accidents, not from the smell of brains and feces and gangrene. His stomach could handle anything.

Anything but guilt, apparently.

Stephen held back a sob trying to make its way out of his throat. His guilt _didn't matter_. Steffen Baar _was dead_. And it was entirely his fault. _His fault._ Nothing could change that.

It's not like he could say he knew the man. They spoke only a handful of times outside of lab procedures, exchanging small-talk and little else over the last three days. Their first name shared the same etymological roots. They were both scientists, both captives. They could make conversation over all that, but three days was hardly enough time to get to know a person. It wasn't his loss to mourn.

But guilt was a funny thing, and the nausea felt similar to the day his sister Donna drowned. Stephen closed his eyes at the memory and angrily wiped at his face. He had no right to this loss, not when he hardly knew him. Not when it was utterly his fault.

When his stomach finally stopped churning, Stephen straightened and washed his face in the sink, cleaning away the blood that had streaked down from the cut on the side of his head. After he finished, his face looked hollow, but at least his eyes were completely dry. The cut would do fine without stitches.

He had no idea how long he was in the bathroom stall, but when he came out, Jada was leaning against the wall. She was still red-eyed, but she too had washed the tears off her face. She held two mugs and offered one to Stephen silently.

After a moment of hesitation, he bridged the gap between them to take it. His hand slightly shook, and for a moment his light, masculine fingers brushed against her dark, feminine hands. Callused hands, he noted for the first time.

"Thanks," he muttered flatly. He couldn't muster anything resembling gratitude. Not then.

Jada didn't seem to take offense. "Just tea. Chamomile or peppermint would be nice, but all we have is black."

"It's fine." It really didn't matter. He held the warm cup in between both hands as he looked down into it. Then he glanced away into the large room itself; as the bathroom and shower area were in an offshoot of the main room, he couldn't see the back corner where the medical cots were from his current position. "How are the others?" he muttered.

"Summer is seeing to Meera," she answered. "She's trying to help her get to sleep, though that will be difficult with the tinnitus."

"Any idea how long this ringing will last?" he asked.

Jada shook her head. "None of us had ear protection—including them, so I guess they don't really care about it. That he shot indoors is worse. They were carrying Glocks without suppressors, so—the best outcome is little to no ringing in 24 to 48 hours. The worst is permanent hearing damage. It could be anything in between."

"Great," he muttered. Then his curiosity got the better of him. "How do you know what type of guns they're using?"

She offered a half-smile. "Dad was a trooper. Taught all of us how to safely use firearms, and identification was part of his training. I currently own a revolver." Stephen wrinkled his nose in distaste, and she outright smirked. "Oh, right—you're a New Yorker."

"Formerly Nebraskan," he countered, "but my dad was more of a fisherman than hunter."

"Shame. Don't suppose I can change your mind about them?"

"Do you think I could change yours?"

Jada smirked again. "Fair enough."

Stephen offered a smirk in return, but what light-heartedness came from that conversation disappeared quickly. His lips downturned and he looked back down at his tea as he let the silence sit between them (other than the damned ringing— _fucking guns_ ).

Still, it didn't mute sound completely. He was close enough to hear Jada inhale deeply after a minute of silence just before she said, "Stephen, it's not your fa—"

"Don't," he interrupted sharply, almost angrily. He then closed his eyes and forced himself to take a deep breath. "Don't," he repeated, this time more softly. "Please." To his utter horror, his voice cracked at the last word and he couldn't meet Jada's gaze after that.

She didn't say anything then, and Stephen left her to go back to the slides he had been labeling for her, before he and his peers had been dragged from the room, before they were culled.

* * *

Within a couple hours, the four doctors were all back at work again, expected to work in shifts with three working, one asleep as if nothing had changed. First Meera slept, then Stephen refused to wake Meera up for his sleep shift, despite the hard and concerned looks Summer and Jada threw his way, respectively.

"You won't help anyone half-asleep," Summer argued.

"I'm not falling asleep anytime soon, and Doctor Mahajan is exhausted," Stephen shot back. She started to retaliate, but he continued with, "I'm organizing Doctor Baar's notes so she doesn't have to. I'm good with chemistry."

Summer pursed her lips into a thin line. "Don't break down on us, Stephen," she said—demanded, even—before taking off to her own workstation. Her British accent grew heavier when she was annoyed, he couldn't help but note.

Jada didn't say anything, but he could feel her gaze on his back, on and off until she went to her own sleep shift six hours later.

Stephen worked every monotonous job without complaint the next twelve hours, pausing only to eat and go to the restroom when necessary. As his body passed thirty hours, then thirty-six hours with no sleep, he kept himself awake through several cups of coffee and gnawing guilt.

He had been up for about forty-two hours and had just about six to go until his next scheduled period when Meera approached him. "Take my shift. I'll go after you."

He lifted his head to look at her and frown. "I'm not for another six hours, Doctor Mahajan."

"You've been up for nearly two days," she answered. Before he could retort, she said, "Please, Stephen."

That was the first time she had used his given name. His brow furrowed, and she distractedly tucked a loose strand of black hair behind her glasses before gesturing to the bed. "I slept over ten hours. I will sleep after you. Please go." When he did not immediately move (perhaps due to the sleepy haze over his mind), Meera carefully reached for his elbow and gave it the softest of pushes.

Her uncharacteristic familiarity spurred him forward and he dragged himself towards the cots. Sleep sounded _very_ nice. "Thank you, Doctor Mahajan."

"Call me Meera," was her soft reply to his back.

* * *

The other doctors didn't say anything about Doctor Baar after that. They didn't accuse Stephen of anything, but he was sure that if they took the time to really consider it, they would blame him for his death.

And rightfully so.

* * *

The date on his watch read May 1st. It was late evening in New York City and three days after Steffen Baar's murder when the metal door to their cell swung open with a loud clang. Stephen winced and immediately hated himself for it.

It was two men this time, both armed. They looked around the room until their eyes landed on him. One of them gestured his way.

"You come with us," he said in stilted English.

Stephen nodded once, stiffly, and walked over to them, purposefully making no eye contact with Meera or Summer, on shift with him, as he made his way to his captors. He pressed his lips tightly as one of them grabbed his arm in a rough hold and marched him out of the room.

He was led down the same hall as three days ago, and from what he could see, they stopped in front of the same door as last time. Why did they want him to see Tony Stark?

In the room were four men, two of whom he recognized. He'd never forget Yusifov's face after the last time he saw him (and there was just the tiniest bit of gratification for Stephen to see that the bruising from his punch was still present on his captor's face). Tony Stark was there, of course, sitting on his bed and looking equally miserable and annoyed. Even in his thick sweater Stark looked a bit underweight; it was something about the pallid hollowness of his cheeks. There was also another gunman in the room. But the fourth addition was interesting: a man in a lab coat just like the one he and the other doctors were provided. This man, perhaps twenty years older than Stephen if he had to guess, carried a case.

There was a large stain on the floor, a copper brown. Stephen looked away from it.

"You are proving to be almost more of a hassle than you are worth, Stark," Yusifov started as Stephen was brought in. "Lucky for you, what you have given us so far has been valuable and worth keeping you alive. And we have spare doctors on hand." Yusifov then turned his gaze to Stephen. "Stark is getting dizzy, faint, and his work is slowing. I need him as healthy as possible, and my doctor has other things to do. This is your job, now."

'I'm not a GP,' is what he _wanted_ to say. But Stephen valued his life more than his pride and nodded once, sharply, and only answered, "I may need some supplies."

"They will be given," Yusifov answered. His own doctor then spoke to him in a language Stephen couldn't identify. It vaguely resembled Russian, but he'd heard enough Russian in New York to know it wasn't that. Maybe a language from one of the former Soviet states? Or maybe it was Turkish? He didn't know enough about languages to guess from there.

After the doctor finished speaking, Yusifov said, "Pull another tube of blood and give us a list of what you need to get him healthy. You have an hour." The other doctor left his case behind on the bed beside Stark, and all of the men left the room, leaving him alone with the man.

Right. Best to just get it over with.

Before he could speak, Stark exhaled and said, "So you pulled the short straw, Doc?"

Stephen paused for a beat, then shook his head. "We weren't given a choice." He opened the large case the other doctor left behind and eyed the accoutrements: a stethoscope, bottles of various medications in numerous languages just from the alphabets on them (Latin, Cyrllic, _and_ Arabic alphabets), the entire contents of a phlebotomy kit, basic surgical tools, several hypodermic needles and syringes with labeled bottles to go with them, and (quite thankfully) all the sanitary necessities needed to go with the equipment. "This is a very well-supplied group," he muttered as he pulled out the stethoscope. May as well start with the basics.

"Even better supplied than the last time I ran into them," Stark said.

He gave Stark a look. "You know who these people are?"

"Unfortunately." Stark pursed his lips together. "Ever hear of the Ten Rings, Doc?"

Stephen stilled. Of course he had; they were up there with al-Qaeda and Hezbollah when it came to 'famous terrorist organizations of the '90s and 2000s' in US media. And there was something else that came to mind about them, too. "Aren't they the group that kidnapped you back in Afghanistan last year?"

Stark shot him a dry, unhappy smile. "One of the cells, yeah. That cell was destroyed. This is a different one. Further north on the map though, I think." He raised his eyebrows at him. "So now you can claim you punched a terrorist. Quite patriotic of you, Doc."

"Patriotism had nothing to do with it," he muttered. "And the name's Doctor Strange."

"Ah, yes. Doctor Strange." Stark's brow furrowed. "I can only imagine the bullying. What a name."

His lip curled in irritation. What sort of asshole said something like that? Stephen held his tongue, if only for his own well-being, and just said, "I'm going to listen to your heart and lungs now, Mr Stark. Sweater off."

Stark pressed his lips together. "Don't suppose I have a choice in this, eh?"

"I don't think it's wise to press the patience of our captors," Stephen said, then pursed his own lips and added, "It would be easier for us both if you consented to it."

He paused in taking off his sweater and gave Stephen a narrow-eyed look. "Are you asking for my _consent_?"

Stephen matched his look with his own furrowed brow. "Yes. Though if you are considering saying 'no', I would strongly advise against it in this—hostile environment."

Stark's narrow-eyed look turned into a frown. "Yeah, I get it." His eyes darted to the side, but then they were completely covered as he pulled off his sweater and—oh, that was a sight.

Stephen couldn't help but stare at the blue, circular glow clearly visible underneath the thin black t-shirt. But he remembered himself quickly and leaned forward to press the stethoscope against Stark's chest.

"Heart's a bit further left than normal—but you should know that," Stark added as he leaned in.

"I've seen the X-rays," he muttered before pressing the stethoscope against him, shifting it until he was sure he was as sure as he could be that he was over the aortic valve based on what he remembered from the X-ray. Then he moved it three more times to listen to the other heart valves in their estimated locations.

"I'd ask if you have an idea as to why they're taking X-rays, but I remember that one of the doctors was a cardiothoracic surgeon. Doesn't take a genius like myself to figure out why she's here."

Stephen lifted up Stark's shirt to listen to his back in four different spots, and only instructed the man to breathe in and out. Once he finished with that, he let go of the shirt and straightened. "Summer—Doctor Weston—thinks they only want to do surgery as a last resort." Stark's heart was still going fairly strong and his lungs sounded clear. He looked down at the otoscope and ophthalmoscope in the case; he may as well be thorough in his examination. Stephen picked up the ophthalmoscope and said, "Eyes next."

As he checked his eyes (brown irises, bloodshot and with dark circles ringing them, but otherwise nothing alarming), Stark muttered, "The last resort's coming sooner rather than later. Yusifov said you give me only a few more weeks until the palladium kills me. That true?"

He switched the ophthalmoscope for the otoscope and moved to his ears. He didn't bother to soften the blow much; there was a reason he left the actual comforting of patients to the nurses. "Unfortunately, yes. The doctors monitoring the toxicity in your blood levels give you another two months, at most." Stark's ears were fine, as far as an otoscope could see. "Do you still have tinnitus from—the last time we saw each other?" Stephen cursed himself for nearly choking on his words, for being unable to reference the fact that the tinnitus was from a gunshot that _killed_ a person whose _blood_ still stained the floor of the very room they were in.

Stark answered, "It's mostly gone. I think I already have some permanent damage from the concerts I went to in my youth, so—maybe didn't affect me too badly."

Stephen hummed in acknowledgement and turned his mind forcefully back to his work. He put both those tools away and pulled out the blood pressure cuff next from the case. An aneroid monitor; he hadn't worked with one of these since med school. Metro-General was all digital now.

"So," Stark continued, "unless you guys somehow find a permanent cure for continuous palladium poisoning, surgery is on the docket."

He didn't answer immediately. Instead, Stephen wrapped the cuff around Stark's arm and checked his blood pressure. A little high, but nowhere near dangerous. Could very much be caused by the stress of their situation. Only when he finished measuring his blood pressure did he answer. "It's likely," he admitted.

Stark pulled his sweater back on after Stephen finished unwrapping the cuff. "Great," he muttered.

He had no words of comfort for him, so he didn't try. Instead he leaned forward. "Say 'ah'." Stark complied; his tonsils were fine. "You can close your mouth. I'm going to check your lymph nodes now." He placed a couple fingers on his neck and felt their size. They were normal.

"You're a surgeon too, right?" Stark asked.

"Neurosurgeon."

"Why are you here? No offense, Doc, but I'd trust a cardiothoracic surgeon with my chest more than a neurosurgeon. If I had shrapnel in my head, though, you'd be the first I went to."

"I'm touched," was Stephen's sardonic reply. "As for me, there are some shards close to your peripheral nerves and one dangerously close to your spine. I'm specifically here for that, though the complications involved with a surgery such as yours makes two surgeons on hand necessary, regardless."

"Oh, that's fun," Stark muttered. "I can't wait for surgery."

Stephen eyed him up and down. "And if it's going to happen, you need to build up your bulk. I don't need a blood test to say that you're suffering from malnutrition. I know the smoothies you're drinking for the poisoning are filled with nutrients, so I'd presume it's a lack of calories more than anything. What are you eating?"

Stark's shrug was not comforting. "What they're bringing, when I remember."

"And how often do you forget to eat?"

Another shrug. "One of them will yell at me once a day. Or every other day."

He gave the man a look. "You need to change that, for your own sake."

"Why?" Stark asked, catching Stephen off guard. He must have shown something on his face, because Stark smiled at him, grim, ugly, hopeless. "As you've said: I have a couple months at most, and I'm too weak for surgery. No doctor's gonna come up with a formula for this in that amount of time, no matter how brilliant. That they were able to stall it as long as they have is a miracle in itself; I thought I was going to be dead by now."

Stephen pressed his lips into a thin line; this was very much not his forte. Still, he had at least one thing on his side: science. "From what I can determine from the last time I looked at the readings in your blood and what I can see now, you're malnourished, but not so far along that you cannot be back at a healthy weight in four weeks to five weeks. When you're back at a healthy weight, you can undergo surgery."

Stark gave him a glum look. "You're so sure of that, Doc?"

"Yes," he answered with more surety than he felt. "So long as you actually eat."

He shrugged yet again, seeming rather complacent about the entire situation. It didn't match the energy the man had three days ago when they first met. "I'll try."

Stephen gave him another long look, and for the first time in his life, wished he was better with this type of thing. He had no idea how to encourage a man to eat; he knew all about the physical ailments and the psychology that made up the _whys_ of someone losing their appetite, but getting that motivation to eat back? He had no fucking clue. That was something for therapists, not neurosurgeons.

If he believed in things like karma, he'd say this was the universe getting back at him for paying so little heed to such things in the past.

Still, he had nothing else to add then, so all he said to Stark was, "I need to draw blood and complete the rest of your physical exam." He doubted there was anything else of note to find, but better to be thorough.

Stark rolled up his sleeve as Stephen prepared all the items from the phlebotomy kit, and the silence that hung over the rest of their time together seemed heavy with unresolved issues.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Edit** to note that a line in the heart exam has been edited to be more accurate. Big thanks to codee21 for pointing that out, and a disclaimer that I'm just an art major pretending to understand all this.
> 
> I think it's a requirement in all my alternate-first-meeting stories that Stephen gets irritated by Tony in the first conversation. They have to *work* for their relationship.
> 
> Hollywood likes to pretend that guns are like, not painful to hear. In reality, here in the States OSHA basically says anything 140 DB or over can cause permanent damage to hearing and so hearing protection is a requirement for workspaces that work in such loud environments. From what I can find, there isn't a modern gun that isn't 140 DB or over unsuppressed. And a suppressor doesn't help that much; it just makes guns sound between 100 to 140 DB, from what I can find. So not damaging levels anymore, but still *super* loud. Indoors is worse for ears because the sound waves bounce off the walls instead of escaping out into the open air, too.
> 
> So yeah, assuming no one else dies, gets mauled, or otherwise horribly injured, they all have a chance at some sort of hearing loss. It depends on a multitude of factors, including genetics, but the possibility is there. I'm pretty sure every terrorist in this story has permanent hearing loss of some capacity, which can develop as tinnitus, the inability to hear certain pitches of sound, and other such things. And that's been your random fact of the day.


	6. I'll Pick You Up Off Of The Ground

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Still plucking away at later chapters. The story's passed 50k because of course it couldn't remain short like it was supposed to. 12 chapters fully written, a lot of content written for the next 3, and it'll probbbabblllyyy be about 20 chapters long. I don't think there's anything more I could possibly add to the outline. Please, characters, just start cooperating with me.

The relief was clear on Summer and Meera's faces when he was returned to their cell. A small part of him was touched that they cared about his well-being enough to be affected, considering it was his fault that one of their number was dead.

He pushed that thought to the back of his mind viciously; now was not the time for such thinking.

Summer quickly approached him once his rather rough escort left the room. "Oh Stephen, thank God," she said, then engulfed him suddenly in a hug. Stephen blinked in surprise, then offered a short hug in return. Hugs were… not really his thing, but well, this wasn't exactly a normal situation.

Thankfully she kept it short and pulled back after a couple seconds. "What happened?" Just behind her, Meera kept at a workstation, but was clearly watching them rather than anything on the computer or under the microscope.

He led Summer to Meera's station so he could keep his voice low. "They're having me treat Tony Stark."

Behind her glasses, Meera's eyes widened and she put both hands to her lips. "Is he hurt?" she asked.

Stephen shook his head. "Not hurt, exactly, but he's not well, either." He considered the situation; these doctors were technically Stark's doctors, as well, so he could discuss his case without breaking patient confidentiality. That was something of a relief. He continued, "Stark has little to no motivation to eat, making him underweight—too underweight for surgery. I think with consistent, full meals he will be fine in four to five weeks, but I have no idea how to motivate him or make him stop forgetting meals without needing to be reminded by our captors. And I'd rather not have them reinforcing meal times."

Summer grimaced at the statement, then pursed her lips in thought. "He wouldn't have access to a timer, would he? Probably not. But he could just turn off the timer, anyway, if he doesn't have an appetite. So it would need to be some sort of inner motivation." She paused. "A therapist might know," she ended as she shook her head.

Meera, however, looked more thoughtful than anything else. "I read about this, though it was a long time ago. But one of the things I remember about this subject is that eating with others can really help get someone to eat. A set schedule, as well. Your timer wasn't a bad idea, Summer, but someone to share a meal with will be even better."

Stephen pinched the bridge of his nose. "So I need to babysit Stark."

"That's not a very nice way of putting it," Summer said, raising her eyebrows. "But essentially, yes, sounds like it." She glanced at Meera.

"For mealtimes," she added, which was hardly the point.

Stephen exhaled. "Well, there are worse things," he muttered, then looked between the two of them. "Any idea how I can convince _them_ of that necessity?" He jerked his head towards the reinforced door.

Meera looked away as she shook her head, and Summer sighed. "I wish I knew," the latter said.

Great. Great.

"Okay, I'll cross that bridge when I need to," he said. "In the meantime, help me figure out what his meal plan should look like and if we need to add anything to it."

Summer nodded in agreement, but Meera hesitated and glanced at her workstation, where she had still several blood tests to run in her never ending search for a cure for the palladium poisoning.

The other doctor quickly caught on. "Let me borrow your station, Meera," she said. "I'll write them a quick note letting them know that we're going to be discussing the best ways to treat the patient with the new information Doctor Strange has, and I'll sign it. That should give us some time." Meera considered the offer, then nodded once, sharply, and stepped away from her computer so Summer could do just that.

After that, they joined Stephen in his brainstorming session, and they thankfully were uninterrupted by their captors during the conversation. Stephen found himself jotting down quick notes as they considered everything they had eaten over their time there, and any missing food items that would likely be the easiest to get. As soon as that was finished, Stephen went to the table where they ate their meals and began composing a draft for the items he needed. Perhaps most importantly, he tried to figure out the best way to tell his captors that a doctor was required to monitor mealtimes so it was one of them, rather than a _terrorist_ , encouraging Stark to eat regularly.

Stephen paused mid-thought, then in his draft letter crossed out "one of the doctors" to say "I" instead. He wouldn't subject any of the others to this, especially after seeing how Yusifov not only treated women, but his backwards attitude towards other races. It was best if all of Yusifov's attention was on him and him alone.

"So, I heard you've been busy," said a voice behind him. He turned to find Jada, who offered him a half-smile before joining him at the table. Ever since their time schedule shifted, Jada missed breakfast's arrival by two to four hours, depending on the day, and spent a few minutes after waking up to eat.

"Did Summer give you the rundown before turning in?" he asked.

She nodded. As she prepared herself a plate of food and poured a cup of coffee, Jada said, "Have you figured out how you're going to ask them about it?"

Stephen exhaled. "Maybe," he muttered. "Something about monitoring during mealtimes, I'm thinking. Suggests less psychology and more physiology, which I think will get a better response."

"Smart," she agreed, and bit down on a buttered slice of bread. The bread was long cold, but she didn't seem to mind. "First and foremost they want him healthy to do—whatever they want him to do. If what you suggest leads to that goal, then hopefully they'll see reason."

He looked down at his draft, nearly complete. He scribbled down another sentence before a thought hit him. "I need to see him every day, regardless. We always get a tube of blood for testing with dinner—and I think they want me to take over all of his medical care. I'll need to draw it before breakfast, before he eats."

She nodded in agreement. "He has the smoothies twice a day, too. You can start taking those directly to him. Saves their men the trip."

"Good point." He jotted a sentence about that, then paused. "How often are the lithium dioxide injections?"

"Weekly. The first dosage was on the 15th, and both Meera and—" Jada broke herself off and looked down, then exhaled and looked back up. "We increased the amount of his dosage on the 29th as we had a better idea of how fast it metabolized once we saw it in action, but if his body keeps deteriorating at the rate it is, we may need to do it again. Or possibly try two injections a week with a lower dosage in each injection. It's—it's rather experimental." She made a face. "We just need to continue to monitor the amount of toxicity in his blood on a daily basis and adjust accordingly."

A pang of guilt hit Stephen as Jada first broke herself off and he let his eyes fall upon his draft as she finished her thought. He feigned writing down a new note, though it was an item already listed on the page. But he didn't like the idea of making eye contact right then. "Okay," was what he answered. "I'll type this in and, well, we'll see from there." He pushed himself from the table and left with a short nod, heading towards the empty computer station. (It was Steffen Baar's former station, now his station, and it was just _wrong_ —)

The messaging program that allowed communication to their captors regarding their daily results and occasional needs was on some sort of enclosed network, from what little Stephen knew about computers. Other than not being connected to the internet, he couldn't say more about it. It allowed him, though, to professionally and succinctly outline his recommendations to improve Stark's health, and he was careful to include that the daily monitoring over meals was to gauge his appetite with the eye of a clinician and to best calculate sudden pivots in his meal plan whenever necessary. Lastly, he requested a scale so he could weigh him and monitor his progress.

He read it over once for typos and, before he could second guess himself, sent it off. There was little he could do beyond that.

Stephen pushed the whole thing out of his mind; thinking about it further would drive him crazy. Instead, he left the computer to help Meera with the enormous amount of blood samples she still had to process and run through various experiments and tests. He remained there for the next several hours until it came his turn to rest. Soon enough, his thoughts faded and he fell into a light doze.

* * *

Someone shook his shoulder as a feminine voice hissed near his ear, "Stephen! Wake up!"

His experience on call had Stephen blinking himself awake in only a couple seconds. Hovering above him was Summer, a nervous look on her face. "Up, quickly. They want you."

She didn't need to tug on his arm to get him into a seated position, though it took a couple more blinks to process that at the doorway of the room were the same two gunmen who had collected him earlier.

"Coming," he called to the two men, and slipped on his shoes as fast as possible before quickly walking towards them. As one of them grabbed his arm (which was _really_ unnecessary, but he had enough self preservation to keep that thought to himself), he realized he forgot the lab coat that he always wore due to the chill of the room. And apparently the extra layer helped, because it was as cold in the front hall as it was in his cell. Great.

Just around the corner from Tony Stark's cell, Yusifov was waiting. Without other things to distract him, Stephen took a moment to actually examine the man who seemed to be the leader of this Ten Rings cell. As he did, he realized the problem with Yusifov was that he was incredibly nondescript. He was of average height and white with short, tawny brown hair. No facial hair. He had the average features of most Caucasian men with a thin, average nose and a completely ordinary set of lips and brown eyes. Yusifov could easily be anywhere between 30 and 50, though Stephen was fairly certain he was over 40. His was a completely forgettable face, and his clothes were too thick to even get an idea of his build. If it weren't for the accent (which he still couldn't place beyond 'Eastern Europe probably'), Stephen would have no way to really describe him that wouldn't also describe half of the adult male Caucasian population.

It was, in some ways, a bit more terrifying than if he were a larger-than-life villainous type. The problem was he looked entirely too _normal_. His was a face he could see passing through any town in America without anyone looking his way before…

Stephen let that thought go. Now was not the time for hypotheticals, not when his reality was already pretty fucking bad.

He was brought to a halt in front of Yusifov, who looked Stephen up and down before folding his arms. "I thought on your request. You are right: surgery is likely, as those two bitches can't do their job and get a proper cure." Stephen did his damnedest to keep his face blank. Apparently he mostly succeeded, for Yusifov continued, "I will allow you to monitor Stark's health during meal times. You will be brought for both each day. You will also draw a tube of blood from him daily for analysis, and give him the medicine he has been drinking." He took a look at Stephen's empty hands. "This is the last time you will not have everything ready to go when you are brought out.

"You will report his health on the computer daily after each meal," he continued. "I want to know everything. Everything that you see and observe in that room you write to us when you are back in your cell. I want to know the moment he is healthy for surgery."

The complete lack of privacy on Stark's behalf bothered Stephen something fierce, but he didn't argue. He _couldn't_ argue, and so he nodded reluctantly in acquiescence.

Yusifov took a step closer. "I don't forget your little fight." He lightly tapped at his own face and the still-healing bruise on his cheek. "If you try anything like that again—any fighting at all—and I will take one of your eyes with a spoon. Do you understand?"

Stephen clenched his jaw and nodded once. "Understood."

"Good." Yusifov made his way past him, and Stephen was ushered further down the hall until they were again in front of Tony Stark's door.

Suddenly, the grip on his arm was gone and another guy— _where the hell had he come from?_ —shoved a container into his hands before the door was opened and he was pushed inside. He somehow managed to catch himself before he fell, but the threat of gouged eyes kept him from doing anything more but glaring at the metal door as it shut behind him.

"You playing delivery boy too, Doc?"

Stephen turned to see Tony Stark lounging in the chair beside the computer on the large, heavily cluttered workbench. It looked like a bunch of code was on the screen, but it was too far to try and make anything of it.

He looked down at the container and could guess what was inside; it looked exactly like the food containers they got, just a little smaller. "Not exactly," he eventually answered. "I'm here to monitor your consumption during mealtimes until you're back to a healthy weight. Clear some space on the table."

Stark's eyebrows rose. "You're _what?_ "

"You heard me. The table, if you would, Mr Stark." Stephen closed the distance between them and looked at the cluttered table, then at Stark expectantly.

He snorted. "Yeah, no, I'm fine. I don't need a babysitter."

"Considering your current state of malnutrition, you apparently do," was his retort.

"What's the bother to them if I don't eat regularly?" Stark gestured to the computer. "I'm clearly _working_. And they save on food if I eat less, so it's a win-win for them."

Stephen exhaled slowly through his nose and tried to consider how to word this without giving too much away to any hidden microphones. It was a much smaller room and he wasn't sure if whispering would be any good in here. Still, he tried. "Because they've already come to the idea that surgery is a very likely outcome for you, or I wouldn't have been taken otherwise," he said lowly.

Stark raised his brows again, then a look of realization hit. "Ah—don't worry about mics, Doc. I disabled them every time they replaced them, and they gave up replacing them ages ago. They learned just to be happy with the camera." He jerked his head towards the door, where Stephen imagined there was a camera similar to the one over his own room's door.

Still, he was surprised by the revelation. "They didn't—retaliate?"

"Retaliation's been in short supply since they realized I'm dying and rather _fragile_." He shot him a wicked grin, though it quickly sobered. "Wish that your existence had just been a bluff, too. Still, they haven't replaced the mic in a while. Not sure what they were expecting to hear when I'm alone in here, anyways."

Stephen nodded. Without the worry of being overheard, he continued, "Then I can tell you that the idea of you needing surgery grows every day with our captors. They'll want you as healthy as possible beforehand so you have more of a chance to survive it. One way or another, they are going to make sure that you eat. I just thought I would be the better option of 'babysitter.'"

Stark pursed his lips at his words, but he ended up pushing aside a couple items on the table so there was just enough room to put down the container. However, he made no move to open it once it was down.

There wasn't another chair in the room, so Stephen opted to lean against the near wall. Perhaps more importantly, the angle kept him from being able to even accidentally look at the days-old stain on the floor. He folded his arms and gave Stark a pointed look. "You're going to need to open the box."

He shrugged. "Ain't hungry, Doc." He turned away from him and started typing at the computer.

Stephen narrowed his eyes at him. "That doesn't mean your body doesn't need food."

"I can eat it later."

"The whole point of me being here is so that it's me, rather than one of them, making sure you eat. They won't let me stay in here forever."

"I don't see why not. I sometimes work better in company. I can tell them that and maybe put a bit more speed into my coding. I'm typing about half my normal speed right now, you know. Then we can be bunk buddies." Stark's eyes didn't leave the computer as he typed at what Stephen considered a fairly decent speed already, and couldn't help but wonder if he was telling the truth or not.

The first thought that came from Stephen, though, was, "There's only one bed in here."

Stark shrugged. "They can drag in another. Or we can _share_." He turned his eyes from the screen to lift his eyebrows suggestively.

Stephen lifted his brow, but in disbelief. _What in the fucking hell was he going on—oh, oh. That was the play here._ "Nice try." He pushed himself off the wall and walked over to the container and opened it himself. "Get off the computer and eat. There's bread and some sort of meaty soup in here, with greens—good, they added vegetables, hopefully ones on the list. Move your keyboard, Stark, I'm placing these in front of you."

The other man scowled at him. "They want me to work. You don't want me _hurt_ by the terrorists for _low productivity_ , do you, Doc?"

His annoyance edged into anger, and Stephen immediately retorted back sharply, "And do you want me to have my eye gouged out because I couldn't get you back to a healthy weight?"

The silence that sat after his comment was heavy. He loudly exhaled, turned away from the table, and took a few steps to calm down and get a grip on himself and his emotions. Stephen was not patient with others, and never had been, but it was possibly a skill he needed to develop quickly if he was going to get through to Stark. Shouting at him wouldn't accomplish anything. _Therapists_ somehow managed this; surely patience was something he could learn out of necessity, if nothing else.

"They seriously threaten to do that to you?"

Stephen turned around and Stark was staring at him, his expression very serious. He sighed and ran a hand through his hair as he decided to be truthful. "The threat's real, but the reason for them threatening me was—for something else." He didn't want to think about it. Any thoughts related to Steffen Baar's death made him faintly nauseous with the guilt, and right now, he needed his head in the game. "I don't know if they'd retaliate. I don't know."

This time Stark sighed, then stood up and carefully placed his keyboard behind the computer monitor. He emptied the box of all food and utensils with a quick, almost robotic efficiency. He then sat back down again and started ripping the hardened bread to soak into the soup.

By the time Stephen processed all this, Stark was on his second bite. Then his third. "Wait, wait," he said, stepping closer. "Don't eat too fast."

Stark shot him an incredulous look. "Are you kidding me? You wanted me to eat. I'm eating!"

_Don't snap at him, don't snap at him, don't snap at him—_ "I don't want you to get sick. Or start choking."

Stark paused at Stephen's reasoning, and then slowed down, though it was only a marginal change. Stephen slowly exhaled through his nose and took his spot back on the wall. Good enough.

After several more mechanical bites, Stark paused and frowned at him. "Can you look at something else that's not me?"

Stephen shrugged. "There's not much else to look at in the room."

"Sure there is. This table itself is filled with interesting bits and bobs."

"I can maybe name five things on the table. I'm not an engineer."

"Yeah, pity you aren't. Maybe you wouldn't be so annoying as an engineer."

He narrowed his eyes. "And maybe you'd be less idiotic if you were a doctor."

Stark smirked. "Technically, I _am_ a doctor. Times three."

"Is this your way of asking me to call you Doctor Stark?"

He waved his hand. "Nah. Felt too pretentious, even for me."

Stephen shrugged. "Could be argued it's a pretension well-deserved." Well, for the doctors that weren't complete idiots, at least. It was amazing how many idiots there were out there sporting PhDs.

"Maybe if I become a college professor," Stark answered, and Stephen had no idea if he was being serious or not. Before he could ask, Stark continued, "That watch of yours have a date?"

It was an automatic, mechanical movement that had him looking down at his wrist. "Yeah."

"Well, what is it?"

Stephen looked back up, brow furrowed. "What? The date?" Stark nodded, once. It was—unusually tense. His brow furrowed even more as he asked, "Don't you know the date? You have a computer."

Stark shot him a dry, unhappy smile. "Whoever their IT guy is isn't bad. They disabled all functions that weren't directly related to what they want me to do—which is code. Having the time and date available on the computer isn't part of the deal I get."

He couldn't help but frown; he was pretty sure the time on the computers they had still worked. "I see," is all he has to say to that strange bit of information.

"So, what's the date?"

Stephen looked at the soup, which had sat untouched since Stark asked him to stop looking at him while he ate. "I'll tell you once you eat a few more bites."

"Fuck you."

A brief grin split across Stephen's features at the retort, but he didn't hold to the threat and looked at his watch. "It's May 2nd just after 9:30 a.m., at least in New York. We're probably in western Asia or Eastern Europe though."

"I could have told you that much," Stark retorted, but his tone wasn't into it. His expression was pensive. "So, May 2nd. Six weeks." He looked down at his soup. "Can't say it feels like six weeks. But the first time felt a lot longer, too."

He could only be talking about the kidnapping in Afghanistan. Stephen had nothing he could say to that, and Stark didn't seem interested in continuing the conversation. He started mechanically eating once more, and this time, Stephen did try to alternate his gaze from Stark to the table, then the cot, then the door, and then Stark again. It got old quickly, but it wasn't like he could do much else.

Stark got about halfway through the soup and ate most of the bread before saying, "I think that's all I can manage, Doc."

"I think that's good," he said. It seemed good, but again, this wasn't his specialty.

Stark, though, now had a narrow-eyed, thoughtful look on his face. "Did you eat before you came here?"

"I was asleep, actually. There should be food waiting for me when I get back."

That answer didn't seem to satisfy him. "You should just eat with me. It's going to get old fast with you just _staring_ at me like that."

"I didn't have much else to do."

"Exactly! And well, that's going to cut my appetite like no other if it continues. It's weird."

Stephen shrugged. "I don't make the rules around here."

Stark pursed his lips together. "Nah, I think I can work something out." He put the remains of his meal back in the box, leaving only the coffee and water that had come with it. After closing it, he placed the box near a metal grate similar to the one Stephen had on his cell door, one that slid up on the outside of the room.

As Stark straightened up, Stephen said, "Don't do anything stupid."

He flashed a brief grin. "Things'll be fine, Doc. You'll see."

Stephen wasn't so sure about it. But it was clear they were being monitored, because it wasn't two minutes later that the door opened and he was greeted by two gunmen. Before they could take him away, Stark shouted out.

"Hey, let Yusifov know I want to talk to him about my health plan."

That was one way to word it. Still, he couldn't help but shoot Stark one last look that said, 'Don't do anything stupid,' just as one of the men grabbed his arm and he was taken away from the room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Was never fond of "Dr Stark". Sorry guys :P If the media calls him "Mr Stark" in _Iron Man 1_ and _2_ , I figure that at some point his publicity team *told them* to call him that because if he wanted it otherwise, *he'd have said so*. Tony's not shy about his acclamations like, at all. He is very self-aware of his achievements. So that's a fanon I just don't get the logic of, sorry :P But the excuse he gave Stephen in this story as to why he doesn't use the title—I, for one, don't believe him. I think he goes by "Mr" for other reasons. He hasn't told me why yet.
> 
> For those curious, having three doctorates is mentioned in _New Avengers Vol 2 #29_. Although the Tony of the comics is a bit different in personality as to that of the Tony in the MCU, the knowledge level is on par.
> 
> I wanted to acknowledge the origin of this prompt by making Tony a wee bit more flirty than I'd usually write him with someone who is still essentially a stranger, including the great ambiguity of "is he joking just to irritate Stephen or is he joking-but-deep-down-not-entirely-joking" that the readers can interpret as they so desire. Either way is valid, especially since he is single at this point of time.
> 
> Sorry to say that Stephen's professionalism will always triumph in the face of it. Ethics are just too important to him—canonically he takes his oath as a doctor very seriously. Flirting (even jokingly) with a patient is such a hugeeee breach in doctor-patient relationships. And I can't see Stephen conducting that protocol breach with anyone while that boundary exists. I know this is fan fiction and stuff but for me at least, having a foot in the real world is what makes the writing of fanfic fun for me, and I tend to write characters with the same foot in the real world.
> 
> (And there's a big reason that Stephen couldn't ever be Tony's primary doctor if they were in a relationship, well, alongside him not being a GP. I'm not even sure if he could be a surgeon for him, either—I'd have to look into the laws/ethics regarding that in US medicine when it comes to specialized surgery. Granted, Tony's rich enough that he could have it done in any country that would allow any surgeons, and Stephen may be arrogant enough during his doctor years to think that he won't be emotionally compromised. But that means something could go wrong… there's an angsty Ironstrange plot bunny for anyone who wants it!)


End file.
